"Mindful" wrote in message
...

"Natty Dread" wrote in message
.. .
I'm having a problem with plants wilting and shriveling in my garden and
I can't figure out why. Here's the situation: The soil on my property
is heavy clay, so two weeks ago, I had a contractor dig up two large
planting beds and till in equal parts of compost and gypsum to make the
soil more workable. They also put down a nice layer of hardwood mulch
which is dark brown in color. One of the beds gets full sun most of the
day and the other gets a mix of full sun in the morning with filtered sun
in the afternoon due to overhanging branches from a willow oak. I
planted accordingly, putting sun-loving plants, including a butterfly
bush, several varieties of day lilies, tall phlox, gaura, black-eyed
susans, echinacea and zinnias in the full-sun bed, and a combination of
liriope, nandinas, azalea and day lilies in the bed that gets filtered
sun. Both beds get watered in the morning because they get hit by the
lawn sprinklers; I think I've got the sprinklers set up to run for 15
minutes a day (it could be every other day, I need to check on that).
The problem is that after several days in the ground, a number of the
plants are wilting and dropping leaves, with the phlox, black-eyed susans
and zinnias having the worst time.

It sounds like you transplanted or planted these plants while in bloom.
That's not the best time to plant them. Is the ground around them
saturated? Even potted plants in bloom sometimes react badly to being
disturbed.

The ground isn't saturated, but it is damp. Some of the plants had blooms
on them when I planted them and some didn't. The black-eyed susans, for
example, were covered with green buds but no open blooms; the phlox were in
full bloom then and have continued to bloom but are losing leaves. The
thing is, though, that I've planted and potted flowering plants many times
and have never had this problem. Of all of the stuff that's wilting, the
only thing I'm actually ****ed about is the zinnia, because I grew those
from seed. They were started in a patio pot where I'm growing a miniature
rose, and were about 9 inches tall when I transplanted them. Zinnias are
usually hard to kill, so I'm going to hope for the best! Thanks for your
ideas.

Rhonda



\
So - what might be a factor in the wilting and leaf-dropping? Could it
be:

- Too much water? We had a lot of rain last week, over three inches, I
think, and the sprinklers are still running every day or every other day.
I put in these plants over two weekends, and when I went to plant the
first round the soil was almost goopy, but when I planted the rest over
this past weekend the soil had dried out somewhat but was still damp.

- The beds are too warm? The mulch gets noticeably warm to the touch
during the heat of the day -- could the roots be getting cooked?

- Transplant shock? I'm not a morning person and the earliest I ever get
out into the garden is noon. It's been in the 90s here, so could it have
been too warm when I planted them? If so, will they recover?

- The compost or gypsum? I can't imagine the compost would be affecting
the plants; it's just organic matter which is supposed to be good for
them. I don't know much about gypsum, only that it's kind of alkaline
and helps to break down the soil. Could the soil be too alkaline now?
To my knowledge, the azalea is the only acid-loving plant I put in those
beds and I fed that with Holly Tone when I planted it. Should I maybe
sprinkle some Holly Tone around the other plants to balance the pH?

Any input from the group would be most appreciated.

Cheers,
Rhonda
Richmond, VA
USDA Zone 7





*****
Basic human psychology is one of my subroutines.